


Seen

by stevierosebudds (vulcantastic)



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Episode: s04e09 The Olive Branch, Fluff, M/M, Post-Episode: s04e09 The Olive Branch, david rose has trauma, soft beyond reason
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-01
Updated: 2021-01-01
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:21:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,908
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28465977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vulcantastic/pseuds/stevierosebudds
Summary: The night of "The Olive Branch," David is finally starting to feel comfortable enough to trust Patrick fully--perhaps more than he even realizes himself.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 24
Kudos: 278





	Seen

**Author's Note:**

> Happy 2021! I surprised myself by writing one more thing before the new year.
> 
> I've been thinking a lot about (a) David's line "I let very few people see me before 9am," (b) David's bed hair, and (c) David resting his head on Patrick's shoulder when he's asleep, like so: https://i.ibb.co/q5bDypb/normal-SC-S5-E3-0049.jpg.
> 
> And I got to wondering when he first did that.
> 
> Shoutout to Twitter and the group chat for encouraging me.
> 
> Enjoy!

Sleep is an intimate thing.

A personal thing.

Or that’s what David has always thought. Ever since he poked his mother’s arm after a nightmare when he was 8 years old and she swatted his hand away, shouting in what he now knows was a drug-induced slur: “David! You mustn’t interrupt mummy during her private time!”

He couldn’t see her expression due to the eye mask, but he knew she was upset. Maybe a touch angry. He never liked when Mom was angry. It made his stomach do flips.

And honestly, she had a point, he thought back then. Sleep was a time when you existed outside yourself. You had no idea what was going on around you, who could see you, what people were thinking or saying (or in David’s case, how much toilet paper a 4-year-old Alexis planned to drape over him while he remained blissfully unaware)… and even as a kid, David decided he wasn’t comfortable with that kind of loss of control.

So David learned to be self-conscious in sleeping. To be meticulous in who he’d dare let see him before noon, when he was bleary-eyed and muss-haired and throaty-voiced and…well, _not_ put-together. Even during their brief fling, David always excused himself from Sebastien’s apartment before the latter woke up, or made sure he was making coffee early in the morning before Sebastien was any the wiser. And the one lazy Sunday at his SoHo flat when he _did_ sleep in, he opened his eyes to find Sebastien quirking a brow at him.

"Wow. David Rose, you look a mess.”

 _You look a mess._ He was teasing, surely, but with Sebastien there was always an edge to every syllable.

David Rose would _not_ be called a mess ever again. Not if he could help it.

So he made it a rule in all his relationships. A routine: _Fall asleep after your partner. Rise before them, shower if needed, fix your hair, apply your serums, moisturize. Come back to bed looking cute and scroll through your phone like you_ literally _woke up like this._

Very simple.

David and Patrick’s first night together at Stevie’s place, as wonderful as it was, saw David on high alert. Patrick too, of course. They were both nervous. That was normal, or so David had learned about new relationships where you actually, um, enjoyed the other person.

After they’d spent most of their night exploring each other, David spent the rest of _his_ propped up on an elbow, watching the easy rise and fall of Patrick’s chest. When he could keep his eyes open no longer, he curled up on his side away from him—wrapping himself in layers of sheets and blankets so that if Patrick woke up in the middle of the night, the most he could confirm with 100% accuracy was that there was a man-shaped lump beside him.

Tonight somehow feels different, though.

After the barbecue, David was starting to think he’d never sleep next to anyone again. Or at least, no one he felt as strongly about as he did Patrick Brewer. And he was starting to think it would be easier if one or both of them walked away.

But as it turned out, when you cared about someone enough—like maybe more than you’ve ever cared about anyone—you stuck it out. You waited. You stayed.

Patrick stayed.

And so did David.

It's kind of irritating, actually—that one person who walked into his life and shook his hand and took a chance on his business has made David so willing to take a chance on happiness.

Tonight, for example, David has already embarrassed himself lip-syncing a five-minute Tina Turner song to Patrick at their store, in full view of passersby.

He’s already bought Patrick a nice dinner (or as nice as you can get at Cafe Tropical, which basically just means ‘edible’).

He’s endured a questionnaire from Ray upon arrival at Patrick’s (it seems everyone was waiting patiently for them to get back together—Bob called Gwen on his cell from _across the cafe_ to tell her the news when they were at dinner).

And now he’s shoulder-to-shoulder with Patrick in the little full-size bed in Ray’s guest room, a place that’s always a little stuffy and a lot cramped.

Patrick has his arm draped around David’s shoulders. He sighs. “Long day,” he murmurs into David’s hair.

“Mm.” David leans up and gives Patrick a peck on the cheek. “Long _week_.”

Patrick looks down at him, expression twisted in a poor attempt to hide a grin. “A week of receiving gifts from me, yeah. I’m sure it was torture.” David pouts; Patrick’s resolve breaks and he grins fully. “I’m kidding.”

David _hmph_ s and nestles his head against Patrick’s chest. He stares straight ahead so he’s looking at Patrick’s bedside table. The boring novel about sailing sits there with an old coffee cup on top that Patrick needs to clean. He’ll bug him about it later. He says, quietly: “I did, you know.”

“Did what?” The rumble of Patrick’s voice is soothing.

“I wanted to get back together the second you left the motel after…everything. Um.” David can feel himself doing that thing where he gesticulates wildly and he wants to stop, but his hands are moving already and it isn’t as if Patrick hasn’t seen him do this a hundred times over. “I just. I couldn’t. I’ve been…I needed time.”

“I know, David. We both needed the time apart, I think. But, uh.” When David tilts up his head, he sees Patrick peering at the ceiling, and his eyes are a little wet. “I’ll be honest. I didn’t think it was possible to miss somebody this much.”

David feels his face growing increasingly hot. He plops back down on Patrick’s chest. “That is.” He exhales, closing his eyes. “Very sweet.”

A pause, then a vibration against David’s ear as Patrick chuckles. “Wow. ‘I missed you _so much_ , too, Patrick.’ Aw, gee, thanks, David. I’m so glad to hear you say that.”

David playfully pokes his chest before letting his fingers linger there, watching his hand move with Patrick’s chest as he breathes.

Because he had. God, he had. He’d missed the way Patrick smelled—like fresh grass, denim. He’d missed how Patrick touched him, a constant: hand on the shoulder here, fingers tracing his palm there.

David had missed just _being_. Like this, with someone who meant a lot to him. Someone who maybe meant everything.

All of this swells in his chest, travels up and up, sticky in his throat and threatening to escape. It’s all so new. It’s too much.

So instead of saying any of it, he just nods, swallowing hard. Pats his boyfriend’s chest and mutters, “Tell me about your week. Tell me about all the super interesting things I missed at the store. And, um, about Ray’s new fascination with tofu that he's taking out on you lately?”

Patrick laughs heartily, and David adores the sound. “Okay. Well. Ray’s on a Thai food kick …”

His voice, steady. The softness of his dark blue pajama shirt against Davids cheek. Patrick’s fingers, trailing up and down David’s back in an arbitrary pattern. That touch, reminding David he’s there. Present. That he stayed.

David thinks he might love this man.

It’s the last thing that crosses his mind before sleep takes him.

* * *

David is very content.

He can feel warm sunlight tickling the side of his face, and he’s cozy under Patrick’s mid-priced quilt comforter. And if he could capture this moment in a cute little bottle to retrieve whenever he’s having a particularly taxing day, he would.

He knows he’d better wake up, though. So he can be there for Patrick when he opens those big puppy-dog eyes and asks David if he wants breakfast.

So David lifts his head, and that’s when he realizes he’d been using Patrick as a pillow _since last night_. They’d shifted slightly, with David moving to Patrick’s shoulder and Patrick having managed to disentangle his arm from around David sometime in the night.

And now his boyfriend is looking down at him, grinning goofily, sleepily.

“Good morning,” Patrick half-whispers, and David sits up so fast he nearly pulls a muscle in his back, which is kind of sad, and maybe he should go back to the gym.

“Fuck!” He runs a hand through the no doubt _disastrous_ mop on his head. “Fuck, I didn’t mean to do that. I was gonna get up and grab us coffees or something—”

“David.” Patrick shakes his head, smiling a little. “Based on the amount of wine we had last night, we both knew you’d _never_ be awake before 9. In _any_ version of reality. And I was gonna go get us coffee but.” He gestures down at himself. “Couldn’t really move.”

“Ugh. God.” David covers his face with his hands. “ _God._ I’m sorry. Did I drool?”

“Maybe? I don’t remember.” Patrick shrugs as if this is _no big fucking deal_. “And sorry for what? David, it was…”

Patrick reaches over and lightly takes one of David’s hands off his face, threading their fingers together. “It was sweet. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so relaxed.”

David throws his hand over his eyes now. If _he_ can’t see anything, does that mean nobody can see _him_? Him with his bed hair and stubble and, ugh, ew, does he have morning breath? “Yeah, because I’m a total _lunatic_ most of the time—”

“No, David, listen.” He can feel Patrick squeezing his fingers. “It makes me _happy_ that you feel comfortable with me.”

David lets his free hand flop to his lap and shakes his head incredulously. "I...I never do this. Ever."

"I know." Patrick is still smiling, expression soft. "But I'm glad you did."

David's blushing again, he can feel it. He shoots his gaze to the quilt. “Well at least look away for your own good. I look … I look like …”

And now both his hands are in Patrick’s, and Patrick is rubbing his thumbs over them, and he dips his head to force David to look at him, and those brown eyes ruin him like they always do.

“David Rose,” Patrick says, firmly. “You look perfect.”

And yes, there’s a bit of laughter in his voice. A lilt, a lightness. But there’s something else, too. It’s something that matches the way he’s looking at David right now. A smile in the crinkle of his eyes, a sincerity in the resoluteness of his voice and the firmness of his brow.

The tears make their way out to dot the corners of David’s eyes before he can stop them, and well. Now that Patrick has seen him like _this_ , crying doesn’t feel so mortifying.

Maybe, he chances to think, none of this is really embarrassing at all.

Maybe it’s all right to be seen—in every way, in any way—when right person is looking.

Patrick cups David’s cheek in his hand. David tilts his head toward the touch, covers Patrick’s fingers with his.

He says, voice shaky with everything he feels at once, everything he wants to say, everything he knows he’ll be able to tell his boyfriend one day: “I missed you.”

Patrick says, “I know.”

David kisses him, and he thinks the the sunlight streaming in through the window has nothing on the warmth of Patrick’s lips on his.


End file.
